Florence Pepper Nightengale
by saichick-Anna-Erishkigal
Summary: Post IM1.  During the day, Tony approaches and Pepper retreats.  But sometimes ... she drops her guard.  What -is- it that makes Pepper Potts tick?  A collection of loosely-related one-shots.
1. Chapter 1

Story: Florence Pepper Nightingale  
Author: saichick  
Challenge: Pepperony 100  
Theme: 088 Nurse  
Rating: PG-13

Timeline: between IM1 and IM2

_Preview: Pepper has a soft spot for wounded warriors. At reader request, a continuation of the "seeing what makes the other one respond" theme first explored in Tickle and React._

She hated it when he was out on a mission.

Ever since the night she had gone down to the basement to find him surrounded by robotic aids, she had been a wreck. Tony brushed off her concerns about the bullet holes pock marking his suit, but all she could think of whenever she saw the suit was that he was going to get himself killed. All Tony did was tinker with it, work on it, improve, test fly, and improve it some more. Ever since he had learned Obediah was secretly double-dealing his weapons to the bad guys, Tony was obsessed with hunting them down and destroying with them. Stane was dead now, but the obsession was not.

The old Tony Stark was a maddeningly immature, self-destructive, womanizing, self-absorbed asshole. Despite secretly nursing a crush for him for over a decade, through sheer force of will she had avoided becoming a notch on his bedpost, just another assistant he bedded and transferred to a distant branch of the company. Tony had his endearing traits, of course, or she wouldn't have been able to endure working for him all these years, but Pepper was a pragmatist. She had no illusions about Tony Stark forming a meaningful emotional connection with an ordinary girl such as herself.

Ever since Afghanistan, however, things had changed. The Tony Stark who had walked down the tarmac of the C5 was a markedly different person than the one who had disappeared 3 months before. He was still impulsive … and maddening … perhaps even _more_ so than before because the new Tony Stark didn't seem to know _who _the heck he was. The transition into the _new _Tony Stark was not a seamless one. Tony had lots of issues he had never dealt with, lots of ghosts. Watching him try on different personas and vacillate between the old and the various _new _versions of Tony Stark as he tried to figure out who he –_was-_ was a roller coaster ride she could have done without. He was driving her nuts!

For the first time in the 10 years that she had known him, Pepper was seeing how emotionally vulnerable he really was. She had caught glimpses of that vulnerability before. The way he sank into a deep depression on the anniversary of his parents' death. The way he pushed his friends away, even Rhodey, who he had known since college. The way he drank himself into oblivion or retreated into his Stark cave to tinker with his robots whenever things got rough. Pepper had figured out within weeks of becoming his assistant that she was dealing with an emotionally damaged 9-year-old boy living in a man's body. Becoming involved with such a … child … would have been almost incestuous.

Now, however, 3 months in a cave had ripped the band aid of illusion off his eyes and forced him to look at the ugly reality of his life. Tony had finally been forced to grow up … fast. He was still emotionally very young, she knew … but since he had come back it was as though she were dealing with an angst-ridden teenager. Tony had definite ideas about the direction he wanted his life to go in, but he still hadn't developed all of the emotional skills he needed to cope with his new reality. Normal teenagers don't have billions of dollars at their disposal, own multinational corporations, or fly around in high tech suits blowing up terrorists. It was an improvement, but he still had a long way to go. That was the thought in her head as she had reined in her impulse to kiss him the night of the dance and pulled away from him.

Tony's Iron Man obsession had even driven her to quit. She initially misconstrued his interest in the suit as just another one of his passing fancies. It wasn't until she saw the cold determination in his face when he told her the only thing that mattered to him was the next mission that she realized _this_ Tony Stark, the one who had come back from Afghanistan, was actually a little scary. Whereas before he had built weapons because he enjoyed pretty explosions and Obie and the Pentagon loved him for it, now, she realized, he built weapons because he was a man possessed by demons. Pepper couldn't fathom what he had seen in Afghanistan to drive him to this madness, but she absolutely could not bear to see him get himself killed!

But then Tony did something he had never done in before. He dropped his guard and gave her a glimpse straight into his soul. Choking up, he explained he shouldn't be alive, he wasn't crazy, and he knew in his heart that helping the people he had put in harms' way was the right thing to do. This wasn't Tony Stark the asshole playboy, Tony Stark the angsty teenager, or Tony Stark the CEO of Stark Industries. For the first time since she had met him, Pepper had looked straight into his soul and seen Tony Stark the _man, _and what she had seen had taken her breath away.

She had to admit that, despite the additional stress it created, she liked the new Tony Stark. In fact … more than liked. The crush she had firmly held in check all these years had blossomed into … something more. Tony now constantly hinted he wanted more from her than just an employer/employee relationship, and she knew he wasn't talking about a quick roll in the hay. The question wasn't whether or not Pepper was in love with her boss. She was. Thinking back to how miserable she was when he was in captivity, she realized she probably always had been, but his emotional immaturity had allowed her to keep those feelings in check. No … the big question now was whether or not Tony had matured enough in the past few months to actually love her back? Not need… Not desire… Not a crush... Not even puppy love... If Pepper allowed herself to drop her guard, to get involved with him, would he commit to her heart and soul the way she was willing, had always had been willing, to commit to him? Or would he break her heart? Maintaining the status quo was preferable until that question had been firmly resolved one way or the other in her mind.

Which left her where she was right now. Pacing the floors of the mansion waiting for him to get back from his latest mission. Systematically, one by one, Tony was combing through the records of weapons sales Obediah Stane had made before he died, hiring intelligence experts to track down where those weapons were now, and was flying out in the Iron Man suit to destroy any weapons caches sold to buyers he wouldn't have approved of. Black market sales were illegal, so nobody was going to stop him if he deprived Al Quaida, Kim Jong Il, or some ruthless African dictator of advanced Stark technology. Tony refused to allow the government to commander his weapons, or to even allow himself to come under the umbrella of a guiding agency such as SHIELD. It was his name on the weapons and they were his responsibility, he had told her. From now on nobody was going to decide who would have his weapons except for him.

For some reason, Pepper was the only person he trusted. If she didn't hang around and wait for Iron Man got back from the latest mission, Tony would fly back into an empty house, alone, banged up, exhausted, and frequently wounded. JARVIS would fly the suit home on autopilot no matter what happened, but Pepper was afraid that one of these days his injuries would be so severe that he would just collapse upon his return and die, alone, trapped in his suit. After she had found him one morning, collapsed on the floor still in his suit after having forbidden JARVIS to alert her to the fact he needed help, she had finally managed to impress upon him the wisdom of letting her know when he was about to fly out on a mission.

"Mr. Stark is approaching the western seaboard, Miss Potts," JARVIS informed her. "My readings of his vital signs indicate he is wounded."

"What is the nature of his injuries, JARVIS," she asked, catching her breath as JARVIS paused to synchronize with the uploaded version of himself in the suit before giving her the status report. A minor concussion, broken collar bone, two cracked ribs, as well as the inevitable lacerations and contusions he always sported after every mission. Tony refused to go to a hospital, so it was left to her, the only person he trusted, to patch him up. Although she had always known basic first aid, Pepper had finally been forced to convince him to have someone from the Stark Medical Research division come in for an afternoon and teach her basic First Responder training.

"JARVIS," she said, "could you please research the Stark Industries personnel connections and find out if we have somebody on staff who teaches basic Paramedic Training?"

"A wise course of action, Miss Potts," JARVIS replied. "Mr. Starks' current injuries exceed the parameters of your First Responder training. Shall I call an ambulance?"

"Do the injuries appear to be life-threatening?" she asked.

"No, Miss Potts," JARVIS replied. "Serious, but his vitals are relatively stable."

"We both know he'll refuse to go to the hospital," Pepper stated. "JARVIS, please wake Dr. Farraday from the medical research lab and ask her to come to the mansion right away. Maybe he'll let her look him over if it's one of his own employees."

"Yes, Miss Potts." JARVIS replied.

"And I want you to do a complete injury scan as soon as we get the armor off," she added. "Look for signs of damage to his brain that might not be picked up by the suit scanners. I don't want him falling asleep and not waking back up."

"Yes, Miss Potts," JARVIS said. "Prudent as always."

Pepper resolved to herself that, if necessary, she would slip sleeping pills into his cocoa and drug him so Dr. Farraday could patch him up. She paced some more as she waited. The doctor returned JARVIS's page and Pepper explained the situation to her. She was primarily a research physician, not a practicing one, but she could be out to the mansion within an hour. It was better than nothing, Pepper mused. It would have to do.

Tony cried out in pain as the robotic aids removed his armor. Quite a bit of blood was seeping out of a wound in his head, probably the one that had caused the concussion. His right arm was useless at the moment due to the broken collarbone. He stepped forward off the assembly platform and immediately collapsed into her arms, unconscious, nearly carrying the both of them to the floor and getting blood all over her clothes.

Since he was too heavy for her to carry, the best she could do was gingerly lower him to the floor and check his ABC's (airway, bleeding and circulation) before going to retrieve pillows and blankets. His breathing was a bit labored, but okay. The head wound was seeping a lot of blood, but didn't appear to be arterial in nature. She would need to attend to that right away. Checking his pulse against the second hand in her wrist watch, she saw his heart rate was far too rapid. His skin was clammy and pale. Lifting his eyelids and peering in, his pupils were dilated and slow to respond to the light. He was going into shock. She promptly went to retrieve pillows and blankets to elevate his feet above his head and keep him warm.

"JARVIS," she ordered, "ask Happy to come into work right away, please. He's going to have to help me carry Mr. Stark up to his room."

"Yes, Miss Potts," JARVIS replied.

"And fire up the scanner," she continued. "You're going to have to scan him here because there's no way I can get him over to the scanner by myself."

"Right away, Miss Potts," JARVIS replied. "I'll have Dummy and Butterfingers maneuver the device over to where he is now so we don't have to move him."

Thank god for JARVIS, she thought. And Dummy and Butterfingers. Since Tony didn't trust anybody but her, she had come to rely very heavily on his robotic friends over the course of the past several months. Now she understood why Tony often preferred them to human company. No matter what happened, she could always rely on them to be there for her. For him. Since she already had the medical kit out and waiting, she promptly began to minister his wounds until Dr. Farraday got there.

Pepper dabbed the gauze in sterile water and began to gingerly dab at the spot on the side of his head where the blood was oozing out at an alarming rate. Head wounds were always nasty, but this one looked particularly deep. He would need, at minimum, stitches. She went through an entire stack of sterile gauze pads staunching the bleeding until she finally cleared away enough of his drying, clotted mass of hair to see the wound itself. Yup … stitches. She applied pressure to the wound with one hand while she dug scissors out of the medical kit to cut enough hair away from the jagged cut that the doctor would be able to give him stitches. Carefully lifting a few strands of hair at a time, she gingerly snipped the hair off as close to his scalp as she could without tugging on the edges of the head wound.

Tony would be upset if she removed more hair than was absolutely necessary, so she only clipped an inch or so on either side of the jagged tear. Blood kept seeping out of the wound at a fairly fast clip, so she had to alternate snips with the scissors with dabs with the sterile gauze. Finally, she had the wound cleared away enough that the doctor could give stitches. Grabbing a stack of gauze with one hand and pressing it into his scalp to slow the bleeding, Pepper carefully gathered the bloody hair she had just clipped with her other hand and carefully folded it into a clean square of gauze, folding it neatly around the lock of hair like a little envelope. Cursing herself for her sentimentality, she slipped the tiny packet into her pocket.

As she waited for the doctor and Happy to arrive, Pepper just knelt there on the floor beside him, watching his chest move up and down with his breath. The neoprene suit still covered him up to his neck, but Pepper feared removing it until she had help. There were things she could do to stabilize the broken bones, but rolling him to remove the under-suit and stabilize ribcage and arm without help could exacerbate his broken ribs and collarbone. Although his pulse rate had quieted down somewhat and his skin felt less clammy, his goatee and hair appeared to be coal-black against the contrast of his too-pale skin. She absent-mindedly ran the palm of her hand down his cheek to his funny little beard, her fingers registering the contrast between his soft skin and rough razor stubble. Tony didn't know it, but Pepper often stole intimate little moments like this whenever she patched him up, whenever he was unconscious or too injured to notice her ministrations had taken on a level of caring no doctor would ever give. When he was unconscious like this, something that was beginning to happen with alarming regularity, she often found herself telling him things she would never admit to while he was awake.

"Got yourself all banged up again, Mr. Stark," she murmured, caressing his face, "and left me to patch up your sorry ass." She watched his facial muscles register a slight grimace as he moved slightly in his sleep and registered pain. Gently touching her fingers to the side of his mouth, she smoothed away the grimace until his facial muscles twitched into a slight smile. She couldn't take away his injuries, but she found some small consolation in giving him what little comfort she could.

"It scares me when you fly off like this," she whispered to her unconscious boss. "What if you don't come back? You have no idea what it was like when you were missing." Pepper recalled the number of nights she had climbed into his bed, crying, curled up with the last greasy sweaty shirt he had worn before going missing. Long after the others had given him up for dead, she had shamed them into continuing the search.

"If anything were to happen to you," she continued, choking back tears, "I don't think I could go on. You – you have no idea how I feel…" Gently, she bent down and gave him a kiss, not the first kiss she had ever given him while he was unconscious … she had kissed his forehead, his cheek, or above an injured part of his body many times, but this was the first time she had indulged the impulse to bend in and touch her lips to his. Gently rubbing her nose along his cheek to his ear, she whispered barely audibly, "I'm in love with you, you know?"

Pepper straightened out, maintaining pressure to the head wound, and waited for the cavalry to arrive.


	2. Chapter 2

Story: Goddess of Healing  
Author: saichick  
Challenge: Pepperony 100  
Theme: 066 Constant  
Rating: PG-13

Timeline: between IM1 and IM2

_Preview: Tony's view of the reliable Pepper Potts … the flip side of Florence Pepper Nightingale._

The first thing he became aware of as he woke up in his darkened room was the slight pressure of Pepper's head laying against his left forearm, one small, dainty hand circled protectively around his injured shoulder even in sleep.

Mission … injuries … Pepper … stepping off the platform and the room beginning to spin … fragments came flooding into his mind as he tried to recall how he had gotten here. He must have lost consciousness and somehow Pepper had gotten him up into his room. She had pulled up a chair, lay down her head, and fallen asleep. He hoped she wasn't too uncomfortable, but she didn't seem to be. He wished she'd curled up next to him, but that was a pipe dream.

"Ouch!" he exclaimed softly as he tried to sit up and pain reminded him of his injuries from the night before. Slipping down the sheet, he saw his ribcage had been wrapped in gauze, his bicep firmly wrapped against his side to immobilize his collarbone. She must have had help, he realized, probably Hogan. He had no recollection of getting to his room under his own power, just dreamlike fragments of what might or might not be memory.

The mission. Another day. Another despot wiped off the planet. Although Tony didn't enjoy killing, especially the up-close-and-personal kind he had been engaging in lately, he felt the Earth was that much lighter without them existing to make other people's lives a living hell. He spared many, men who threw down their weapons and surrendered, but he killed more. In the parts of the world he frequented these days, the bad guys had no qualms about murdering innocent civilians, so Tony had no qualms about killing them.

The innocent civilians. Those were the ones who haunted his dreams. Night after night, he saw a parade of faces of the dead, innocent men, women and children, sometimes entire families clinging to each other for shelter even in death. All the people he could not save. He was not a super human. He had no special powers. All he could do was learn from his mistakes, tinker with the suit to make it better, and hope he was able to save more the next time. Guilt overwhelmed him as he recalled just how many of those innocents had died at the hands of his weapons, the weapons he had created, before Yinsen helped him understand he couldn't just send his golems out into the world to kill, maim and injure without maintaining responsibility for how they were used.

Pepper stirred, her copper hair caressing his arm. Tony turned his attention to his goddess of healing who, once again, had brought him back from the brink of misery simply by being there. So much time he had wasted! Just the sight of her sweet face, alabaster skin and endearing freckles asleep on his arm brought his thoughts back from the dark path they had wandered down and home again. She was always there for him. The one constant in his life. No matter how dark the world got, she would corral him back on track and get him moving forward again. Without her, his mind would have succumbed to madness long ago.

Even before Afghanistan, he had always had a tendency to self-destruct. Now … it was even worse. The last thing you want to be when hurtling through the air at mach 1.8 speed wearing nothing but a metal suit is suicidal. Whereas before he really didn't even _think_ about the darkness inside his own soul, nowadays, he all-too-easily obsessed about the things he saw. It was as if the Creator had taken all the dark things about himself that he always tried to drown in a bottle, thrown them into a blender with a healthy dose of megalomania, and then projected it onto the wall for him to battle like Plato's allegory of the cave. It would be all too easy to stoop to the levels of the monsters he dealt with, turn to the dark side as Obadiah had done, if he didn't have a copper-haired angel sitting at home awaiting his safe return.

All he could think of since returning from Afghanistan was becoming worthy of winning her heart. Lord knew he was trying! But after 10 years of watching him burn through life like a wildfire, Pepper was cautious about getting burned. He couldn't blame her, but she didn't seem to understand that things had changed. _He _had changed. The first few months had been a game. His first crush on a girl, he realized. Woo the girl. Try to hold hands. Sneak up behind her and pull her ponytail and shout BOO! Think of clever ways to outsmart her and break down all her defenses. Sneak a kiss. Win the girl and live happily ever after. All very innocent and sweet.

It was only after Obadiah Stane had tried to kill her that he realized his feelings for her transcended the roles they found themselves in, transcended even love. Tony found himself reaching for her like Adam reaching across the roof of the Sistine Chapel to touch the hand of God, begging for her to grant him a new life.

Dreams of her had gotten him through Afghanistan alive, and now dreams of her motivated him to drag his sorry ass home no matter how dark his thoughts turned nor how injured his body was. Sometimes when he was injured, he had hallucinations that her patient ministrations were more than the efficient first aid skills of a very competent personal assistant. Sometimes when she dabbed at a cut with gauze or felt along a bone to see if it was broken, he could swear her touch lingered, as though she were willing her fingertips to remove his injuries. Once he even thought he felt her kiss the skin next to an enormous bruise on his rear shoulder to make it better.

Sometimes he dreamt she spoke to him when he was unconscious, like last night, telling him all the secrets she kept locked up inside her heart that he had so little success getting her to tell him in real life. Last night was one of those nights. Hazy images of Pepper caressing his cheek while waiting for help to arrive flitted through his mind. He knew those images were probably not true as the real Pepper Potts wouldn't let him get within 6 feet of her, but who knew? Maybe she had? He had discovered Pepper had an unconscious fascination with his whiskers.

More images flitted through his mind. A doctor. Stitching up his head. Tony lifted his right hand and gingerly felt the side of his head. Hair missing. 12 … no 13 stitches he counted with his fingertips. Vague recollections of Pepper gently chastising for dragging his sorry ass home for her to patch up, her fingers against his head as she cleaned the wound flitted, dreamlike through his mind. Pepper leaning in for a kiss. Pepper whispering in his ear that she was in love with him. No … that part of the memory must be a dream. Pepper would never make such a revelation in front of another person.

Tony gently placed his hand on her sleeping head, soft as a butterfly landing on a flower, so as not to awaken her. She would never tolerate such intimacy while awake, but his heart melted as she smiled and murmured something in her sleep as he caressed her hair. She was a hair-twirler, his Pepper Potts, twirl-twirl-twirling her hair like a little girl whenever she was nervous, tantalizing him with what he could see but was never allowed to touch. He twirled it now, gently, first twirling, than running his finger and thumb along the snaky swirl to make it as smooth as silk once more.

The first two months after his return, after she had shot down his "superhero girlfriend" offer cold, Tony had devised all manner of devious experiments to test the limits of her tolerance. Although the goal had changed from getting her into his bed to worming his way into her heart, in a way, it was a mere continuation of their previous relationship. While at first it was fun to concoct elaborate schemes to keep her off-balance and aroused, Pepper always held back.

Finally, it had dawned on him. Pepper was waiting for him to finish growing up. Of course! What an ass he was! Winning Pepper's heart wasn't just another seduction on steroids. It was something else altogether. Something he couldn't understand, much less give. He just hoped to God that whatever that vital ingredient was that he was lacking, that the Dude Upstairs would hurry up and give it to him so he would be worthy of her. Although Tony still concocted elaborate plans to get close to her and see what made her tick, he had stopped deliberately throwing her off balance. He did enough of that without even trying! Intentionally stressing her out was cruel. Especially if he drove her to quit again. Whatever else happened between them, she was too important to him to jeopardize the one constant he had in his life, her friendship.

Tony decided he would wait. For her. She was his anchor and he would respect her desire to take things slow. For the first time in his life, Tony Stark was exercising self-control and letting a woman take the lead.


	3. Chapter 3

Story: Quiet Still Moments  
Author: saichick  
Challenge: Pepperony 100  
Theme: 047 Still  
Rating: PG-13

Timeline: between IM1 and IM2

_Preview: At reader request, a continuation of the story line started in Pepper Florence Nightingale and continued in Goddess of Healing. Pepper's viewpoint this time._

It was the slight tug of Tony's hand in her hair when she shifted her head which woke her. Sometime during the night he'd reached over and tangled his fingers in her long hair. She, in turn, had rested her head in exhaustion onto his forearm, one hand curled in his, the other touching his injured shoulder. The intimacy of their positions struck her. Somehow, in the stillness of sleep, the two of them had quietly gravitated towards each other in a manner neither would allow when awake.

It was tempting to drift back to sleep and wallow in the affection of that one, small gesture, but her back hurt. She was also afraid he'd misconstrue her concern as a green light to resume the constant sexual overtures he had thankfully recently abandoned. For 10 years Tony had tried to seduce her. After Aghanistan, his efforts had almost become laughably childish as he hinted he wanted more from her and pulled out all the stops. Then, without explanation, all efforts to seduce her had suddenly stopped.

He still wanted, needed her, at his side as much as possible, if anything more so than before, but the blatant sexuality of his overtures had changed. She had no idea what was going on in that genius mind of his, but she had to admit part of her missed the fact he no longer found her physically attractive. Still … for the first time in his employ, she was beginning to relax in his presence. Occasionally he made a halfhearted pass as a joke more than anything serious, but she could tell his heart just wasn't into it anymore. Without Tony constantly trying to get her into his bed, the only prurient impulses she had to control these days were her own which, ironically, were more powerful than ever.

So as not to wake him, Pepper gently extricated her hair from his grasp. He murmured when she did so, unconsciously reaching for her as she slid away. She ended up slipping her small hand into his, intertwining her slim fingers between his large, strong ones to replace the hair he only reluctantly gave up. Holding his hand while he slept denied her the mobility to go about and begin her day, but she found she didn't mind. Until he awoke and reassured her his head injury had done no lasting damage, she didn't want to leave.

It also gave her a legitimate excuse to stay at his side and gaze at his features, highlighted by the eerie silver-blue light of his arc reactor. Even injured and exhausted, he was a beautiful man. The sheet had slipped down at some point during the night and his chest was exposed, or at least that part of it that wasn't wrapped in gauze and ace bandages to stabilize the broken ribs and collarbone. She absent-mindedly ran her finger from his injured collarbone down to his arc reactor, gently feeling the bumpy scar tissue surrounding the socket housing the device which kept him alive. She noted that the tissue looked discolored, inflamed, as though his body was fighting off a low-grade infection. She traced one of the thin angry red-blue lines emanating from his arc reactor to his chest. He had been burning the candle at both ends again. He was run down. She made a mental note to ask the doctor for antibiotics.

Pepper loved these quiet, still moments that she was able to steal with increasing frequency. She hated the fact the suit took him away from her, put him in danger, could get him killed. But a larger part of her relished how vulnerable he was when he got back. As much as she loathed the suit, the part of him she was hopelessly in love with, the _new _Tony Stark which 3 months in a cave had unearthed from beneath decades of muck, was as integrally tied to the technology and its mission to save the innocent as his shattered heart was kept beating by the arc reactor. Without one, she understood, she would not have the other.

Tony's moods were tied to his missions. If a mission went badly, if he didn't make it there in time, if he wasn't able to save everyone, he would not speak about what had gone wrong. He would quietly remove his armor and retreat into his workshop to tinker, refusing to eat and speaking to no one. She wished he would talk about it, or at least talk to Rhodey, but he refused. Rhodey called it his "lone gun-slinger act" and reassured her it was just a man's way of dealing with things, but Pepper was not convinced. She feared Tony would self-destruct, return to old habits if he kept it all bottled up inside. The best she could do was quietly try to get his mind off things.

She knew he felt responsible for the part his weapons often had in causing the harm he was trying to rectify. All she could do was refocus his attention on the here and now, what needed to be done that day. Redirect his thoughts back into the land of the living. It annoyed him to focus on the mundane when he had enormous earth-shattering problems on his mind, but she knew that pulling his mind back into this reality, nudging him back into the here and now, was necessary to prevent him from becoming overwhelmed and imploding.

If a mission was completely successful, if he defeated the bad guys, saved the innocent, and totally escaped serious injury, his joy was far more addictive than the most potent drug. Tony would animatedly strut around his workshop, simultaneously prattling on like an elementary school child about how the mission went and tinkering with the robotics on his suit as he had JARVIS compile a long list of improvements he wished to make before the next mission. He was beautiful when he was happy, his face afire with happiness, and his joy at the fact he had made a difference in the world was highly contagious. A victorious Tony Stark was her heroin, her drug of choice, and she was his addict.

Then there were nights like last night, nights when he came home injured. She hated the fact she could have lost him, he could have died, that he was in pain. But another part of her stole what little bit he had to give her, his soul lay bare to her patient ministrations as she patched up his battered body and gave comfort to his injured soul. What she was too terrified to approach under normal circumstances lest she fall prey to his overwhelming sexual magnetism, she could touch freely without fear when he was injured. It was a strange sensation to feel both sorrow at his pain, yet joy at running her fingers along his skin, his muscles rippling beneath her touch, and know she was the only person in the world he trusted to do this. She willed herself to focus the unrequited love in her heart as she tended him out her hands and into his wounds to speed his healing. It was a silly thought, she realized, that her simple touch could make a difference, but it made her feel better, less helpless.

Tony stirred, bringing her back to the here and now. His grip tightened on her hand, as if he realized even in sleep that she had awoken and was attempting to flee. He grimaced and murmured her name. She knew if she left, he would immediately wake up and get out of bed, against doctors orders, further injuring himself in the process. There were things she needed to get done, but it was still early. They could wait. He was more important.

"Shhhh…." she whispered, reaching up her free hand to sooth his brow. "I'm here. Sleep."

He shifted slightly in his sleep, murmured something incomprehensible, and settled down. She didn't dare speak to him now, not the way she had last night, because she knew he only barely walked the world of sleep. One move, one word, and her quiet, still moment would be over. They would be forced to resume their rigid employer/employee roles and she would have to raise her guard. Stolen moments such as this were the only time she had to convey her feelings in the language she knew he understood, touch. Tony was a purely physical creature, craving connection in the only way he knew how to receive it. Pepper dared not touch him while awake as she feared her baser impulses would gain the better of her, but now, now she could let her hands say what words had failed to convey, what she dared not say, that she loved him. She gently stroked the forearm she had fallen asleep on earlier.

She was exhausted. She hadn't gotten any sleep either. At some point she dozed off again. She awoke to find her traitorous head had reclaimed its comfortable pillow on his arm, his dark eyes open and intently staring at her as she slept, his fingers still intertwined with hers.

"Good morning," he murmured.

"Good morning, Tony," she said, sitting up suddenly. "How are you feeling?" She tried to extricate her hand from his, but he kept her firmly in his grasp. He reached his other hand over to the one he held captive and stroked the inside of her forearm, sending warm little shivers up her arm.

"Thank you for taking such good care of me," he said quietly, avoiding her question.

"Just doing my job, Mr. Stark," she said, trying to nudge the intimate moment back into their waking employee/employer roles.

"We both know that is not your job, Pepper," he said, his intense gaze causing her heart to race and a pleasant warmth to spread throughout her body. He shifted his grip to more tightly intertwine their fingers and increased his ministrations to the sensitive skin on the underside of her forearm. Smiling a sad little smile, he continued, "I don't know how I'd survive without you."

Had he pulled her towards him right then, wrapped his arms around her and tried to kiss her, she probably would have succumbed, but he did not. Raising her hand to his lips, he gently kissed her hand and then released it, loosening his grip on her fingers so she could escape, but he did not pull his own hand away from hers. As he had been doing so often lately, it seemed, he was offering her the choice. She momentarily froze, not sure whether to escape or lean in to kiss him. She desperately wanted the former, but 10 years of habit made her do the latter. He was injured. Making love to him would exacerbate his injuries, she justified to herself in her own mind, and ruin the fragile new accommodation they seemed to have come to lately.

"I'm glad you're okay," she said, feeling stupid and disappointed even as the words left her mouth. "I'll go get you some breakfast."

"Thank you, Miss Potts," he said, his expression sad as he said the words he knew would put their relationship back on the professional footing he knew she found comfortable.

Pepper scurried out of there as quickly as she could to prevent herself from doing something she knew she would later regret. Her quiet still moment was over.


	4. Chapter 4

Story: It's a Wrap  
Author: saichick  
Challenge: Pepperony 100  
Theme: 098 Pretend  
Rating: PG-13

Timeline: halfway between IM1 and IM2

_Preview: Tony's hamming up his injuries so Pepper will play nurse. He's also hiding something. Less angst, a more hopeful endnote. At reader request, a continuation of the "injured during a mission" story line started in Pepper Florence Nightingale and continued through Goddess of Healing and Still. _

When Tony finally awoke the second time, he was definitely feeling better. He hurt all over, of course, but his mind was less fuzzy, his thoughts clearer. Last nights' mission had left him injured, but it had also been a success. He searched for Pepper and found her still asleep in her chair with her head resting upon his forearm. He had reached out and found her hand sometime in his sleep, he realized, as he registered her small, dainty fingers intertwined with his. Her head was holding his other arm hostage, a delicious bondage he wished to prolong as long as possible. He knew as soon as she woke up she would bolt out of there, so he simply held her hand and gazed at her face, feeling the gentle coolness of her hand soak up the warmth from his.

There was something he really needed to tell her. Actually, there were _two _things he should to tell her, but the newer piece of information would only add to her stress levels and cause her to worry, something he wished to avoid. Besides, he still had time. Just because previous attempts at fabricating a replacement for palladium had failed didn't mean he wouldn't find a solution. But, if she was going to be patching him up, sooner or later she was bound to notice that he wasn't healing as well as he should be. So far he had been able to hide the symptoms. He knew the heavy metal poisoning from the arc reactor's fuel could kill him since the normal course of treatment, simply removing the source of toxicity, wasn't an option, but he still had time to come up with a replacement. JARVIS was crunching the data and coming up with tests for alternatives even as he slept. Why worry her when there was nothing she could do to help?

He was still contemplating how to tell her the first piece of information, how he felt about her, when she finally stirred. Pepper wore her heart on her sleeve, so to speak, her emotions clearly visible in her face whenever she stepped outside the narrow persona of Miss Potts, personal assistant, but she also kept her impulses in check with an iron glove. Exasperated at his lack of progress, JARVIS had finally suggested he watch a movie about a horse whisperer, a man who tames skittish horses. Although it was hard for him to maintain the self-control to wait for his skittish mare to approach, he took inspiration from Pepper's self-control when it came to him. There would be no wooing Pepper until she was good and ready to be wooed, and everything he had seen so far indicated she was too wary the changes in him were temporary to allow herself to become involved with him. Yet.

Was her revelation last night real? Should he tell her he felt the same way? Or was it just a dream? His subconscious projecting comforting images into his mind to help him deal with the pain of his injuries? While part of him wanted to sweep her off her feet and confess his love, the new Tony Stark, the part of him that cared what she thought and felt it was necessary to become worthy of her love before trying to simply _take _it. Like the horse whisperer in the movies, he realized he had to gradually earn her trust, sit back and wait for her to approach before they could ride off together into the sunset. He hoped. She was definitely circling closer these days, he noticed. He was in a rather hopeful mood this morning.

How long had she had feelings for him? The old Tony Stark, the one who had died in a cave in Afghanistan, had been fascinated by her, but was too callous to really take notice of what _she _was feeling. The old Tony Stark only cared about what _he _wanted. How long had she been holding him at arms' length despite having feelings for him? Thinking back, he suspected it was a very long time, a feat of self-control he could only marvel at. He was still gazing at the beautiful creature he wished to make his own when she finally opened her eyes.

"Good morning," he murmured, trying to put her at ease. His little bird was about to fly away.

"Good morning, Tony," she said, sitting up suddenly. "How are you feeling?" She tried to extricate her hand from his, but he kept her firmly in his grasp. Now that his other arm was free, he reached over and stroked the inside of her forearm, trying to convey to her through his touch what he was having so much trouble saying with words.

"Thank you for taking such good care of me," he said quietly. How many times had she been there for him, taken up the slack, gotten him back on track, covered for him, cared for him, and he had been too selfish to notice? He was trying to rectify that oversight by thanking her whenever he could, but the words felt awkward in his mouth. His preferred way to thank her would have been to take her in his arms and kiss her, make her body sing under his touch, but Pepper wouldn't allow it. For her, he was learning an entirely new language. He watched her intently, observing clues from her demeanor at how he was succeeding communicating in _her _language. It was taking him a long time to come up to speed.

"Just doing my job, Mr. Stark," she said. He could see her fighting to regain the prim and proper Miss Potts mask that would allow her to keep control, shove the intimacy of the moment back into rigid employee/employer roles. He wished he knew what she needed to see, to hear, and to earn her trust so she wouldn't do that anymore!

"We both know that is not your job, Pepper," he said. God! If only she would just come out and tell him what vital ingredient he was missing so he could go down into his workshop and research it, crunch the numbers, fabricate it out of raw materials and integrate it into his soul. Then he could stop pretending he wasn't hopelessly in love with her.

She was trying to escape, but he could see (if it wasn't just wishful thinking) that she was conflicted about leaving. He desperately wanted her to stay. He shifted his grip to more tightly intertwine their fingers and increased his ministrations to the sensitive skin on the underside of her forearm. Hoping to sway her indecision with honesty, he added "I don't know how I'd survive without you."

"I'm glad you're okay," she said, indecisive. Then the Miss Potts mask slid firmly into place. He knew right then he had lost. This time. His skittish mare had spooked and now he'd just have to wait until next time. Pepper was back into her personal assistant mode as she offered, "I'll go get you some breakfast."

"Thank you, Miss Potts," he said, feeling profoundly sad as he uttered the words he knew would put their relationship back on the professional footing she found comfortable. She scurried out of there as quickly as she could.

Tony felt disappointed, but if he took things in perspective, he realized he had also made some progress. Over the past few months, Pepper had gone from backing away from him every time he got within 10 feet of her to only backing away from him whenever he got within arms' length. Seven feet! In 4 months he had gained 7 feet of trust which, given the fact he had never gained an inch in the previous 10 years combined, was quite an accomplishment. He smiled. Might as well look on the bright side.

"JARVIS," he ordered, "open up the shades and let some light into this room. What time is it?"

"8:30 a.m., Sir." JARVIS replied. "Miss Potts has ordered that you are to get some sleep."

"Since when do I do what I'm ordered," he joked, throwing back the covers and sitting up. Ouch! That definitely smarted, but he caught his breath and then moved more carefully to avoid moving the broken bones. "Start the shower … 120 degrees … I smell like a goat!"

Swallowing a half dozen Percocet, he ripped off the bandages and hopped into the shower. He groaned as the hot water began to massage away the aches and pains. He stayed in there nearly half an hour, until the pain meds began to kick in so he wouldn't grimace every time he moved. Pulling on his favorite jeans and wifebeater, which he knew Pepper enjoyed because he had caught her subtly staring at him on more than one occasion, was difficult with a fractured collarbone, but he managed.

Excepting the fact he had been caught off guard and wounded, the mission had otherwise gone well. He had defeated the bad guys, saved innocent civilians, and blown up a decent sized arsenal of Stark technology. His mind began to whir about ways he could improve the suit to prevent a repeat of last nights' injuries.

Pepper was always interested in his missions, though he only talked about the ones that had gone well because he didn't wish to weigh her down. He decided he would go downstairs and find her. He really didn't want to have his ribcage bandaged up again, but pretending he did would provide him with an excuse to have Pepper tend to his wounds. He would enjoy the look on her face as she pretended not to notice the lean muscle mass he had built up while in Afghanistan.

He found her in the kitchen, absent-mindedly humming an old folk tune about a dark-haired lover as she cooked eggs, toast, and sliced up some fresh cantaloupe. Tony was a bacon man, himself, but whenever he asked for some she would lecture him about cholesterol. Tutti frutti it would be, he smiled to himself. Anything to make her happy. Now that his pain meds had kicked in, he was in a playful mood. As quietly as he could, he snuck up behind her and looked over her shoulder, waiting for her to take notice he was there.

"Oh! Tony!" she exclaimed, stepping back and impaling his foot with her 4-inch high heel. "I didn't know you were up!"

"Ow-ow-ow-ow," he yelped, playing it up for all it was worth. It was a good thing he'd put on his shoes or he really _would _be in pain right now. Those heels, those delicious sexy heels she wore, were deadly. He took advantage of the fact he had caught her off guard to wrap his arms around her and pull her back into the length of his body, spooning into her and holding her as though he needed her for support.

"Ohmigod, Tony, are you all right?" she exclaimed, too shocked to realize he was full of baloney. It was a good thing his grip was preventing her from turning around and seeing the shit-eating grin on his face.

"Su re-ow-ow-ow," he continued, leaning in towards her ear to rub his goatee against her earlobe, something he knew drove her wild. "Good thing I have another one!"

"Wh-what?" she asked.

"I have another one," he murmured directly into her ear in a low tone of voice. "Another foot. Get it. It's a good thing I have another foot because you just _broke _the other one. Now … if you'd broken some other part of my anatomy … say … around 3 feet higher … that would have been irreplaceable…"

"Tony," she exclaimed, elbowing him in the ribs to break his hold and exasperated at his deception. "You're so full of crap. You're wearing shoes!"

"OUCH!" he yelped, this time for real. "My ribs!" He doubled over in pain. He wasn't expecting that. Pepper glared at him a moment until it dawned on her that she'd just elbowed a man with two broken ribs in the ribcage.

"Ohmigod, Tony, I'm so sorry…" she said, rushing over to him and putting both hands around his midsection to feel along his ribs.

"Ow-ow," he said, half heartedly. It hurt, but the pain subsided the moment she had put her hands onto his ribs and begun to feel along the bones of his ribcage. It was a good thing he'd downed so many painkillers, he thought to himself.

"Here, sit down," she said, leading him back to sit on the edge of the kitchen table. "Let me look at you."

"Ow," he whispered, giving her his saddest, pained puppy-dog eye look. "That hurt." He managed to stifle a grin as she peeled off his shirt to get a closer look and felt along his ribs and collarbone with her fingers.

"I'm so sorry, Tony," she apologized. "You startled me."

"I was just curious what you were making," he whined, hamming up the moment and enjoying her guilt. The truth was, he'd gotten exactly what he deserved, but he'd never tell _her _that. He was enjoying her ministrations a little too much. He wondered if he had a masochistic streak and then smiled as images of Pepper dressed in nothing but black leather undergarments, 4" heels, and a whip popped into his mind.

"What's so funny?" she asked, noticing for the first time he didn't seem to be too bothered by the fact she'd just elbowed him in his broken ribs.

"Oh, nothing," he said with feigned innocence. "Sometimes it's better if you don't know what goes through the mind of a genius." He waggled his eyebrows suggestively at her and then grinned.

"Tony! Leave it to you to be inappropriate even when wounded," she exclaimed in exasperation.

"Eggs," he said.

"What does that have to do with anything?" she asked.

"Eggs," he said again, nodding towards the stove. "They're on fire."

"Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "No they're not!"

"No, but they're definitely burning," he said. "I can smell the smoke."

"It's your own fault," she snapped at him. "I hope you like your eggs well done because I'm not cooking you another pair."

He gave her his most innocent, sweetest smile as she firmly click-click-clicked over to get the pan and slid his eggs into his plate. She glowered at him with her sharp blue eyes while they ate the chewy, well-done eggs, her scowling, him smiling at her and giving her an innocent gooey-eyed stare as though everything was perfect with the world. After a few minutes, he noticed she began to sneak glances at his chest, which was still bare since he'd deliberately omitted putting his wifebeater back on. He could feel the warmth of her gaze as it slid down his shoulders to his hands, and then back up again and down to where his abdomen disappeared from sight under line-of-sight of the kitchen table, then back up to focus on his arc reactor. Her scowl subsided into a thoughtful gaze.

"You should ask Dr. Faraday to prescribe some antibiotics for that," she said absent-mindedly.

"What?" he asked.

"Your chest," she said. "It looks like your arc reactor is causing some kind of infection."

"Oh," he said, his mood suddenly darkening. "Yeah … I noticed. It's nothing. It'll be fine."

"You're not fine. You're run down," she said, the anger gone from her face, replaced by concern. "You can't keep burning the candle at both ends like this. You need to take better care of yourself."

"Yes, mommy," he grumbled. He wondered if he should tell her about the problem with the arc reactor, but decided against it. There was nothing she could do to help, so why worry her.

"And eat your cantaloupe," she added. "The vitamins will help you fight off the infection."

He dutifully obliged. Pepper cleared the dishes off the table as he sat there nursing his morning espresso. There was nothing more disgusting than drinking coffee _before _eating your cantaloupe!

"The doctor said you should really keep your arm immobilized until your collarbone heals," she said. "And your ribs wrapped."

"I agree," he said, his mood suddenly lightening at the prospect of having Pepper play nurse with him. "We should strap pillows around my entire body so my personal assistant doesn't elbow me in my broken ribs anymore."

"Tony," she said, rolling her eyes. "If you didn't come sneaking up behind me, I wouldn't have elbowed you."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he muttered, rolling _his _eyes and pretending to be annoyed at the prospect of her wrapping him up like a mummy. "Let's get this whole mummification thing over with." He deliberately got out of his seat and sat on the edge of the kitchen table so he would be at eye-level as she wrapped his ribcage. He wanted to _see _the expressions cross her face as she pretended _not_ to enjoy watching his muscles ripple under his skin.

"Lift your arms so I can get at you," she ordered.

"I can only lift my left arm to here," he said, lifting it a foot off his ribcage and no more. "I won't be able to lift it further until the bone heals."

"Dr. Faraday said we should immobilize that," Pepper murmured, half to herself. She was in super-efficient nurse mode.

That didn't matter. Tony was an excellent showman. He knew how to ripple the right muscle at exactly the moment it would catch her attention and distract her from what she was doing. If he played his cards right, she'd have to re-wrap him more than once before she regained her focus enough to finish the job. He feigned a stretch with his one good arm, cracking his neck to one side and rotating his shoulder in the socket, causing ripples to move through that entire side of his body. He noticed the movement caught Pepper's eyes and she paused, momentarily, before shaking off the distraction. Tony smiled. He'd stopped deliberately baiting her, but he did _so_ much enjoy testing the limits of what made the uber-efficient Miss Potts tick. Despite the fact she still kept him at arms' length, he'd realized that _he _made her tick.

As she leaned in close and reached around behind his back to pass the roll of gauze from one hand to the other, the side of her face so close against his that he could feel her skin tickling his goatee, he inhaled her scent. She must have taken a super quick shower before coming down to cook him breakfast because her hair was still damp and he could smell the apple-blossom shampoo that she favored. He deliberately moved his jaw ever-so-slightly; just enough to heighten the sensation of his facial hairs rubbing against her face, but not so much as to alert her he was teasing her. She straightened out as she unrolled the gauze across the front of his ribs, than leaned in again to pass it behind him several more times.

"You're getting quite the bruise," she commented, gently rubbing her fingers along the edges of where a large reddish-black area shouted "broken ribs." "Does this hurt?"

"A little," he grunted, inhaling his breath sharply. Actually, it hurt quite a bit, even with the pain killers taking the edge off, but he wasn't about to admit that. Her gentle touch was somewhat erotic, especially as he knew it would be the jumping off point to touch other, less injured parts of his body. He bent his neck a little to inhale a little more of her scent from her freshly washed hair as she continued to examine his injuries in the light of day, run her fingers along each rib and linger in the places where the bones were broken, and finished wrapping his ribcage.

"We're going to have to immobilize your arm so you don't break your collarbone any worse than it already is," she murmured, her attention now focused on his upper chest. "JARVIS says it's just a fracture, but if you move it wrong, it could break all the way through."

"Okay," he murmured, enjoying the sensation of her fingers lingering on the fractured bone even as pain from the slight pressure shot through his body. She wasn't pressing hard, really, just gently massaging the skin over the injured area as if to sooth it. He definitely always felt better for the discomfort when she was done, as though her gentle touch had massaged away some of the injury underlying the pain. She proceeded to wrap his bicep against his side so his movement wouldn't cause the collarbone to move with it, risking further fracture.

Finished with her wrapping, she straightened up and looked directly into his eyes with her beautiful, cerulean blue eyes. As always, whenever she did that, it left him speechless. If only he could say the words that got stuck in his throat whenever he looked at her! Since he couldn't make his mouth form the words, he just stared intently into her eyes, wishing she'd allow him to tell her in the language he felt comfortable using, touch. Catching his breath, he reached up with his good arm and touched her face.

"Thank you, Pepper," he murmured, unable to get anything more elaborate out of his mouth.

"You're welcome," she smiled, pausing a moment before straightening up and clearing away the medical supplies.

He noted, with a small feeling of triumph, that she had _not _called him Mr. Stark. Nor had she yanked away from the intimate gesture of touching her face. His skittish mare had approached and let him briefly touch her face before moving off. It was a victory, albeit a small one. He would make himself content with it until the next opportunity presented itself.


End file.
